Bursar Update - 25th July 2025
As we adjust to Workday in UCD since going live on the 8th July, I can happily say we have now had over 3,000 unique users on the system and 25,000 sign ons. We have made payment runs for expenses, invoices and students, which demonstrates that our system processes work from start to finish.
While it is great to see such wide use of the system, we are also aware that there are some blockages in the system. We know that 800 expense reports have been initiated but have not yet been approved. We are also aware some expense reports are being rejected due to missing information, most notably expense justification and supporting evidence.
We know that not all approvers are set up correctly on the system at present and we need to work through that with you. We can fix part of that but we also need all budget holders to check that their approvers are set up as they wish to see them. Additionally, there has been some confusion on who should be approving expenses and purchase orders. A simplistic approach for most areas would be 'tier 2' approver status (up to €100k) to be used by Heads of School/Unit and PIs. Heads of School/Unit may delegate level 2 to a senior deputy. Beyond that, Heads of School/Unit and PIs should delegate 'tier 1' level authorisation (up to €5k) where they deem necessary, to other approvers. This is a simple version of how it should work and one of our team will happily sit down with a Head of School/Unit or PI to work through this with you locally.
Progress update on other issues raised last week
- Each PI should be able to access their research accounts. To date, all that was available was summary data. We have finally started uploading transactional data for research accounts but it is likely that these uploads will extend into next week.
- We are making good progress on testing cost centre reporting of actual v budget and are on target to have a basic report be available online and live from 31st July. The quality of reporting will improve to a high standard in the subsequent weeks during August and September.
- Non-staff expense payment processes:
- The student process for payment of expenses for all student groups is now working well.
- External Examiner expenses are now being processed via Workday. Please refer to the Finance Office Website for further details.
- Ad Hoc payments will continue to be processed outside of Workday. A new application form and further details are now available on our Finance Office website.
We have dealt with 1,000 logged queries but still have another 900 outstanding. A lot of them are linked to approval levels and research data mentioned above but there are a number of smaller issues arising too. We know from dealing with a wide range of UCD staff, how patient you have been with us to date. The Finance team is stretched and working so hard. The whole team is so grateful for your tolerance in not having everything working well at present, and we really want to get everything right for you over the coming weeks.
I will be in touch again next week with an update of progress and in the meantime, please keep your queries and concerns coming to finance.systems@ucd.ie. If there is anything extremely urgent, please get in touch with me.
Thanks
David